Big Brother Alert: This GoogleGlass App Knows When You Are Stressed

We've heard a lot of buzz about Google Glass over the past few years, but I gotta be honest—I still don't know a lot about what it can do. At least, what it can do that's worth the $1,500 price tag, amirite? Well, here's something: MIT and Georgia Tech researchers have developed an Android app for Glass that turns the high-tech specs into your own personal stress monitor.

BioGlass tracks your respiratory and heart rates (two physiological markers related to anxiety) using Glass' built-in accelerometer, gyroscope, and camera, which can pick up subtle body movements caused by our breathing and heartbeat. Ideally, we could use that information to nail down what triggers our stress levels and what calms us down throughout the day.

Considering how stressed the average American is—42 percent report that their stress level has increased over the past five years—and how unhealthy we know stress is (um, it could literally kill you) the BioGlass app could be an awesome tool in helping us all chill out. The only drawback: it's hard for BioGlass to track respiratory and heart rates when we're doing any kind of vigorous movement (leading it to report those moments as stress when we're actually just slogging away on the treadmill). Plus, there's still that $1,500 investment you need to make for Google Glass itself.